


Necromancing the Devil

by Vesperchan



Category: Naruto
Genre: BAMF Sakura, Death and the Maiden, F/M, Haruno Sakura-centric, Labyrinth References, MadaSaku Week, Madara Uchiha - Freeform, Madasaku - Freeform, Naruto world AU, Sakura Haruno - Freeform, Summoning, Uchihasaku week, Uchisaku, after the war, dark prince trope
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-19
Updated: 2016-07-30
Packaged: 2018-07-25 09:17:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7527046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vesperchan/pseuds/Vesperchan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Never fall in love with something dead. Really, that should be rule number one.<br/>After being banished from her village in a political move Sakura resorts to drastic measures to feel like she isn't so useless after all. She should have know not to make deals with devils.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

Sakura knew there was truth in the words of her parents when they warned her that idle hands were the workshop of the devil, she just never imagined how literal those words would be. She had never been fantastic at seals, the way she wished to be, but she had imagined she would have been able to deal with whatever came undone from the seals left behind in the abandoned shrine at the cresting edge of the Haruno’s most distant property in the Land of Tea.

“Not an imposter, but a true necromancer…” he mused with unguarded interest lighting up his eyes as they picked her apart, piece by piece until she had nothing left to hide.  The dead man made her feel too vulnerable.

“You.” Her eyes couldn’t not be wide. “I’ll put you back,” she said, proud of how powerful her lie sounded. Her voice didn’t shake like her heart did.

“Why would you want to do that?” he asked as he reached up to pull apart the folds of his robe.

The ends of his top exposed bare skin and a nasty looking seal, spinning and circular with red veins that flickered against the black lines like the embers on a charred log. He inhaled and the marks turned darker before exhaling out the sweet air. The action made the almost invisible flecks of red in the seal flare and blaze for a moment before they grew dim again. Breathing in and out it was hypnotic how he drew her eye. He was handsome enough, gods was he handsome, but it was the seal on his chest that sucked the bulk of her attention away. It was the same as the miniature one resting around her navel.

“You were a mistake.”

“Sending me back would be the mistake,” he warned, red eyes glowing. “You think this is not the fate of the gods that you of all people would resurrect me after our history?”

Sakura almost took a step back, but made her back ram-rod straight. “We have no history. You are no one to me but the monster that nearly stole the happiness away from all my friends. I’ll put you back and protect them.”

She saw the vein of panic before he could hide it. Uchiha were usually so much better about hiding their emotions, but Madara Uchiha had been too angry for too long to not be as expressive as he was. 

She felt her hair prickle her neck as it levitated away from her skin. Chakra was running fast through her and she was ready to dip into it.

“You…do not make mistakes. You reached for power, I reached for escape, our hands were meant for each other.”

He took a step and the rod in Sakura’s back melted as she bent at the knees and scooted backwards, hands up and cautious. He took another step, and she retreated until her back met the solid bark of an aging redwood. She inhaled and he stopped just beyond her reach, tall and looming.

Swallowing, he looked down at the base of her abdomen where her seal hid under the hem of her shirt’s fabric, and he moved to kneel before her; closer. He was so tall that even kneeling his face was level with the base of her chest. When he reached for her she moved to hold him back by his hair. His advance paused, but a moment later he eased his face closer, her hand on his shoulder having no more luck than the one in his his hair as he rolled up the hem of her shirt.

“Your story is here,” he breathed, not caring that the breath that carried his words caressed her flesh like a phantom and made goosebumps spread out across her skin. “ _They’ve_ rubbed off on you, that ambition, that thirst for power and dominance. Banishment suits you.”

“It’s a temporary measure to ease political fissures,” Sakura hissed, hating how her face flared with heat. She couldn’t blush and look pretty, only angry.

Eyes flicking upwards Madara drank in the sight.

“Forbidden from what you were so comfortable with, you ninjutsu, you turned to the things before time, the gods of life and death and everything in between.” He moved his hands to her hips, ignoring the lack of strength the hand on his shoulder held. Her hold of his hair was almost…erotically pleasant. “Your ancestors were priests and priestesses before they all went mad.”

“That’s not my intention. I…it was a seal, it wasn’t part of the banishment prohibition treaty.”

Madara hummed and she felt it. “A loophole for power. You sought a new way to make yourself dangerous and here I am. Who better to humble the nations than the man who united them in the first place? How foolish they were.” He leaned in and pressed the side of his face against her seal. His skin on hers made lightning flare under his contact. He was near vibrating.

“You’re the devil,” Sakura hissed, reaching for that old hate she once burned with. It had been many years now.

“Yes.” Madara lifted his head and looked up at her from beneath her breasts. “But you know I am no danger to you.” He leaned down and kissed her seal and she felt him through his. “Because you are my priestess, holy and devoted while I remain the devil worshiped in reverent whispers and blood.”

Sakura hated how she felt so weak all of a sudden. A handful of years and a peach pid sized seed of resentment couldn’t be all it took to fall so far that she was willing to join hands with this devil. He had nearly taken everything from her during the first war. So what if, years later, the worst of her depression would end her in front of her former best friend with a head bowed like the lamb at the slaughter. She was the scapegoat, she knew and she couldn’t blame Naruto for it.

_‘I couldn’t ask this of anyone else,’ he told her._

_‘Don’t worry about me. I’ll wait for it to all die down. Until then…’_

That had been nearly a year ago and the itch that came with the lack of fight and flight made her near insane. Banned from what she loved and what she was best out, she turned to a new field. Scriptures and the half incoherent writings were only so engaging, but the seals and summoning crests were so similar to those ninja used she couldn’t turn away. Seven months of her nine month banishment went into making her the necromancer.

“I never called out to you. I’ll send you back.”

His hands were leaving bruses on her hip bones with how he gripped her then. She hissed and he relaxed. “No you won’t.”

“I will.”

He kissed her seal again and then trailed his lips higher, pushing the fabric up with his nose. “You will do many things to me, but that is not one of them.”

Sakura wanted to scream, but it was so hard to just remain standing. The seal around her navel, once white and unbroken, had morphed into something she couldn’t comprehend. “I won’t let you, I won-I will….I will. S-Stop it!”

She nearly slipped when her legs quaked at the knees and he caught her, easing her down to the ground and keeping her back to the ancient tree. She tried to stand and he only let her bend her knees before he pinned her down. His tongue licked the dip of her navel and she squirmed with how the heat flared through her. When he looked up his eyes might as well have been pins tacking her down like a butterfly on a cork-board. 

She couldn’t breath.

“Fear me. Love me, for I am your slave.” When he looked into her she knew he had seen her secrets and was holding them in his eyes for her to gaze back into. He knew what she wanted, what she was hungry for with a vengeance. The nasty underside of her heart was his to read. His to taste, his to devour. 

He kissed her again and it was reverent. “Let me rule you and the world is yours.”

He was dead and he was her devil and she had no excuse for how she closed her eyes in resignation and pulled him to her because he was right. 


	2. Home

**_Day Two_ : **[theme: home] A **place you can never go back to**

 

* * *

Sakura woke with a start in the night, chasing away the appertain of a black mare from her mind. There were beads of cold sweet above her eye lids and down her throat, across her shoulders and her chest. She felt her heart flutter between her ribs like a strangled bird. Her nightmares had grown so graphic since her studies turned towards the necromancing arts. The seal on her stomach tingled and she almost reached down to trace it, but tensed when a weight beside her in bed shifted.

Sakura bolted from her covers, a knife in hand. She was all angles and teeth, eyes wide and fierce in the darkness like twin pools of green fire, burning seaweed on the shore. Madara just hummed in teasing pleasure.

“You’re so…rowdy at night.” His eyes might have flashed red in the hood of shadows over half his face, or maybe it was her head playing tricks. “Is there anything I can do to settle your soul, love?”

Sakura cursed and her dark words made him chuckle low and dark again.

“You’re supposed to not-you left. You were just something I made up inside my head,” Sakura moaned, gripping the sides of her head, huge handfuls of hair straining between her fingers. She blinked rapidly, trying to see something better than what was actually in front of her.

“I’ve been called a dream before, but I must admit I enjoy it so much more when those words come from you.” He shifts in the darkness and the lines of shadows over his body move. Arms out in front he paws across the bed and slips to the floor on silent steps. He seems to grow as he draws himself up to his full height. Towering. He’s towering.

“I made you up inside my head.” She sounds like she’s trying to make herself believe that.

“Don’t you remember your own tears, love?” He reaches for a strand of her hair and she feels when it’s tugged between his fingers. The pinpoints of her scalp tingle at the ministrations. He’s so much softer than she was when she pulls at her hair. There’s plenty of space between them, but he’s so overwhelming it feels as if there’s no space there at all. “You remember when you called me to you?”

“I tried to send you back…”

The memory plays out in her mind. She tried, without chakra, based off her shoddy memory and the fragments of what she saw in books and scrolls and stone walls. The recoil had knocked her out and when she woke up she was in her bed and he was gone, like it had all been a bad dream. That was two days ago.  

“I did send you back!” Sakura counters, pulling her hair from his fingers. “You were gone.”

“I wandered. I watched over you good and well, tucked you in all snug and safe, but I had too many hours on my own to not test my new limits. I can travel two miles away from you before the nausea and headaches become crippling, which is more than what most necro- summons can boast.”

“What did you do to the village?” Sakura snapped.

There was only one village anywhere nearby, it was modest enough and without a single ninja to defend it. They were too small to be worth attacking, and occasionally hired samurai would step in. It was the perfect place for someone like her to hide out until the banishment wore out. She didn’t want to have to pack up and leave so soon.

“What do you think I would do while you slept?”

He laughs and it’s a deep and dark sound. It leaves Sakura feeling even smaller. There are a thousand dead souls in that laugh, a hundred burned homes, a dozen raised villages. He is no ordinary intruder. He’s Madara fucking Uchiha.

He reaches for her and before she can stop it with her reflexes like syrup, he has the hem of her nigh shirt between his fingers. He lifts it swiftly until the seal on her stomach can be seen. It’s dull and nearly invisible, but his red eyes flash again as he activated the sharingan and Sakura’s seal glows.  The seal around her navel, once white and unbroken, had morphed into something she couldn’t comprehend without the glow of his vermillion eyes. It almost looked like a version of the design around his pupil.

His fingers, calloused and rough, traced over her skin. “Mine.”

Sakura cursed again, sounding like she was in misery, and that made him laugh again. “Damn it.”

“This is what you wanted. Don’t you remember why?” He pulled back and his voice was a teasing imitation of her own from the day before. “ _It’s a temporary measure to ease political fissures_.”  

Sakura’s hand flies out on it’s own, striking him across the face and even without chakra Sakura has always had strong arms and an even stronger flare for anger and viciousness. Madara’s neck snaps with the hit and he’s sent reeling onto his backside.  When he looks up at her there is blood in the corner of his mouth and his eyes are red again, glowing impossibly bright. The look was one of a stalking animal. A hungry animal.

“I don’t want to see or hear from you ever again,” Sakura hisses, bile rising in the back of her throat. She’s vibrating with the shame and anger trapped between her ribs. Her banishment was one of the most difficult things she ever had to endure, and every day it killed her a little more. He made light of it.

“That might be a tuff hard, love,” he hums, rubbing the blood from his lip back into his mouth. He sucks it off his thumb in pleasure. “I’m your devil, remember. I’m bonded to you. You’re the one who summoned me after all. There is nowhere else I _could_ go, even if I wanted to, but I can assure you I don’t.” He laughs at his own little joke.  

“I’ll send you back, sooner or later. For now, just stay out of my bed, and my room too. I-“ Sakura stops herself and swallows the angry words.

She tries to remember what it was like when she reached out to all the voices and asked for a spear of vengeance, one delivered from the heavens. She wanted power, she wanted to be mighty again. They took her chakra from her, sealed it up and turned the well she had saved up into something shut off. She could feel it still, especially during idle times, but the recoil of trying to access it made use impossible. It had been something they decided among themselves after the great war when the nations decided that the fastest rout to peace was to lessen the ninja presence in the world. Less teeth make a mouth that more docile, right?

She had been flashy enough during the war to be the perfect sacrificial lamb. She wasn’t someone Naruto would miss from a leader’s standpoint. She wasn’t like Sasuke. She wasn’t like Kakashi or even the others of her age and class. No, she was the easy choice. Probation felt like banishment though, and Sakura went to bed angry every night.

Madara hums, eyes narrowed as he watches her struggle down her emotions. He then stands easily, still impossibly tall. When he smiles it’s an imp’s smile. “As you wish, love.”

He leaves and she doesn’t see him for the rest of the night, but that doesn’t mean she sleeps.

* * *

Madara takes to her like a ghost. He makes her breakfast in the morning, a full wide array of foods warm and ready, but he’s nowhere in sight when she looks. He’s not in the house, it’s too small to hide in, so Sakura sits and she eats and then because she feels like it, she cries again.

Minutes later she’s washing herself off and out the door, ready to gather and harvest what she can to sustain herself with her remedy making. It’s the same things she did every day last week, and the week before that, and the week before that.  

She toils a day away from home, but when she comes back, there is dinner waiting for her. It’s some sort of roasted bird and cooked vegetables from her own garden. It smells too good, and Sakura isn’t used to eating well, so she sits down and fills her stomach. She pulls out one of the scrolls from her family’s vault, and rereads the passaged she marked for review last she read it over. She makes her own notes in a blank book that is slowly becoming ‘not blank’ with each night of study.

The light from her fireplace is low with only one and a half logs left when she first sees him.

Madara comes in from outside with a pair of split cedar logs in his hands. Without addressing her, he kneels in the fireplace and feeds his wood to it. The iron poker he found fits too easily in his hand as he stokes the fire. It’s only for a moment, but in the stuttering light Sakura thought she saw Sasuke in Madara.  

“Where were you today?” she asks, before she knows she has opened her mouth.

Madara looks back over at her and his eyes are black beads framed in handsome lashes that reflect her too clearly, but Sakura doesn’t flinch or draw back. “I didn’t go far, you would have felt it if I had tried.”

“I didn’t.”

“Yeah, but you trekked a good ten twelve miles today, so I was there with you.”

She remembered what he said about a limit of two miles and then she feels the wave of disgust for her own abilities. “You were tracking me all day?” ‘And I never noticed you once.’

“Not quite. I always feel you, I always know where you are, or what direction you’re in. If you knew how to, you could pull me to your side over those two miles in an instant.” He turns back around, still crouched, and looks up at her more fully. “Should I teach you?”

“Will you teach me how to send you back?”

He breaths out, and Sakura can’t tell if he’s amused or frustrated. “And where would you be without me? You would just be calling back out to the void again for a different spear of justice. You won’t find anyone more willing or more worth it than I. That red haired sand brat tried, he was plenty willing, but in the end he was nothing in comparison to an Uchiha such as myself.”

“You’re artfully modest.”

“There is nothing I have to be modest of.”

Sakura curls her lip. “But that doesn’t change how I feel about the person who nearly destroyed my life and village. I remember what you did. I remember what you are.”

“I’m almost as bitter as you,” he teases. Sakura’s reflection in his eyes becomes too vivid.

Sakura nearly stands, but it able to restrain herself. “I am _nothing_ like you, I’ve never-I would never do something like that to so many people. My friends died because of you. Men will never walk again because of you, good men and good women all suffered during those days.”

“Then why did your heart call to me?”

She’s struck dumb. In the silence only the fire speaks, crackling and popping with heat. Madara stands, drawing himself up slowly until he’s towering above her and the couch she’s on. With a single step he’s nearly close enough to touch her. If he collapsed she’d have him in her hands.

There had been so many voices in the void. The Haruno, the ancient ones, kept their halos open. The unbroken circlet was a symbol that stood for how they didn’t discriminate against the gods and opened their eyes and minds to all. Other clans and other people who couldn’t take the madness devoted themselves to just one god or goddess and put that symbol inside their white circlet. That left them with access to less power, but the madness didn’t touch them until too late in life.

Without practice, when Sakura opened herself up to the Call, when she trespassed into the void and asked for what the texts called the Spear of Justice, it took all her tricks and mental power to stand fast and not fall mad. Inner Sakura became an active force all of a sudden after years of dormancy. She hadn’t remembered seeing or feeling anything like Madara, only wishing for it all to be over. Her heart hadn’t called to him. It _couldn’t_ have!

Sakura swallowed her doubts, looking up. “I didn’t.”

His hand brushed her collarbone. “You did. You’re still calling to me, love.”

“You’re evil.”

“Yes, but you’re my priestess and I am your slave.” His fingers on her breastbone quiver and his eyes are bright again, bleeding vermillion. “You called to me, your heart screamed for mine because we are more alike than you care to admit. They’ve thrown you aside. You’re cast out from a place you can never return to, no matter how much you may love it.”

“I’m not like you, they’ll take me back. I wasn’t abandoned.”

He almost looks angry when he flinches at her words, and one hand holds her neck, loose and reverent. “You may think that, but they’ve already taken back your other teammate. He’s been their friend for nearly six months now, though he seldom stays there. Why do you think that is?”

“Naruto trusts me. He’s not going to forget me.”

“He already has!” both his hands are around her neck and he’s pushed her back, but there is no threat in his action. He can’t hold her that tightly, he can’t shover her that roughly. On her skin his hands tremble wildly but he tries his best to stay connected to her. He sinks to his knees and his head falls against her breast. She feels his breath like a distant thunder. “Only I remain. You can only rely on me.”

Sakura almost wants to believe him, but she remembers too well, and knows what he is.

“You’re a devil. Leave me.”

He does.

* * *

In the morning her breakfast is made, but not as elaborately as the day before’s. The same is said for her dinner. He doesn’t appear when she studies at night, but she hits a pocket of text that makes sense, so many he did try to appear before her and she just never saw him. She falls asleep across the table and wakes up again in her bed. The same happens the next day, and then the next, until she wakes up and he’s in the corner of her room, reading.

Sakura inhales and shifts in bed, stretching out but refusing to move from the covers. It’s cold in the land of Tea, more so than what she’s used to. Her bed is too warm to leave.

“What are you looking at?” Sakura asked from her covers, still half asleep and groggy. Her voice is rough even to her own ears and she coughs.

Madara leaves what he had been looking at to stand and grab something from her end table. He touches her and she scoots away, but he huffs in agitation. “Here, you were coughing in the middle of the night too. Sit up.”

She feels his weight dip the bed and grumbles as he pulls her up and then touches her lips with something ceramic. She sips the water and it’s what she needed. Her lugs are sore from all the coughing, and she knows he’s telling the truth about how she slept.

“When do you sleep?” she asks, trying to remember if she had ever seen him sleep. Do the dead need to sleep? He was dead, wasn’t he?

His arm is around her shoulders, holding her up as she sips. “I sleep only for dreams, these days, but even that’s rare.” He huff when she hesitates over the rim of the glass. “Well, aren’t you a terrific medic. What are you doing letting your body catch a cold?”

She manages to glare sideways at him. “I don’t have a cold.”

“You’re not well.”

“Okay, that’s normal though. I used to get sick all the time until I became a medic and was able to better monitor what goes on in my body. I can’t do that anymore so sometimes things…happen.” She swallows and her throat feels sore, but she hides the wince. She’ll be fine in a few minutes and a few sips.  “I’m not going to be sick, I can treat myself.”  

“Hn, for a medic you don’t have very healthy habits. Would you eat so much if it wasn’t already made for you?” A stay hand traces her sharp ribs and Sakura huffs.

“I get distracted easily, that is common enough. When I get my chakra back it won’t be like this.”

“You think it is only a matter of time?”

Sakura huffs. “What else could it be? I wouldn’t have agreed to be sealed if I believed otherwise.”    

Madara doesn’t say anything for a while, and he’s so warm Sakura almost falls asleep in his arms. She thinks, with a mind full of wool, that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to fall asleep in his arms. Whatever he was in the past, he’s warm in the present and she’s been cold all night long.

She sneezes suddenly and he chuckles from behind her. “So you’re not going to be sick?”

She’s a little more awake now, but no more willing to leave her warm bed. Sakura moves away from Madara and pushes at his shoulder with his hand. He chuckles at her efforts as her arms shiver under the stress. Sakura switches it up and tries to kick him out of her bed, but that just makes him laugh. He catches one of her ankles and holds it, making her fall backwards onto her back as he looms. He’s always looming.

“What am I going to do with you? Oh, you’re as weak as a bird, love.”  

“Don’t call me that.”

He laughs and then kisses the inside of her ankle before letting her go and setting her water back on the nightstand. Sakura is quick to scurry under her covers as he leaves, laughing.

The place where he kissed her ankle still tingles and she hates how she knows she’s going to feel him there, his lips on her  skin, for the rest of the day.

Her day isn’t long, since after breakfast anything she tries to do ends up with her sitting down and closing her eyes. The words she tries reading all dance off the page in a foggy mess that make her think she’s drowning. Reading is always the hardest thing for her to do when she’s tired.

Halfway through the day she decides to take a couple of pills and go to sleep. The best thing for her when she’s like this is rest. It’s been a few times that she’s needed to really power down to recover, and not having her immune boosting chakra to help isn’t doing her any favors.

She knows Madara was right when she can’t fall asleep because of the chill. She’s too cold, even in so many covers. She’s sweating, but it’s a cold sweat and her core is something that can’t be warmed. She’s missing something, and the memory of her chakra almost makes her want to cry. It’s not a cold like the kind she treats others for. She knows it’s stemmed from her lack of chakra. Her body doesn’t know what to do without it after so long of having perfect control. It was like this during the first week as well. Every other month brings her down with the chills and she just needs to sleep it out.

This won’t last forever. Naruto always keeps his word. He won’t forget her. Others might, but not Naruto. She just needs to wait it out, she just needs to sleep it out too. She can do that. She can be strong for him. He believes in her. She’ll be fine. She’s fine. She’s fine, fine, fine, fine-

“Damn, you’re shivering. What did I tell you?”

Madara pulls back the covers and reaches for her waist, pulling her back until she hits his chest. He’s laid out in the bed behind her and the covers fall back down over the both of them. Sakura tries to turn, but his arm is around her stomach, pinning her to him. Sakura stiffens when she feels the heat of his naked chest.

“Don’t worry, I’m mostly decent for you, love,” he tells her, not without disappointment in his tone.

She feels one of his legs reach for hers, slipping in between her knees and twisting around her ankle. The skin where he kissed her earlier still burns, and she remembers in too vivid detail how he looked down at her with his face between her ankles, lips stretched into a crooked grin. He shifts just a little more from behind her and her breath is caught. Sakura wonders if he can hear her heart in her chest racing.

Maybe he does hear it, or maybe he reads her mind because he then leans down to whisper in her ear with a voice as heavy and slow as syrup. “If you’re cold, there are other… things we could do to heat your body up.”

“Don’t you fu-ough” Sakura’s words break off in a cough that wracks her whole body. She shivers terribly and curls up into herself, even as Madara tries to keep her close to him with his arm around her chest and legs around hers. His whispers are a touch too light to not sound frightened. She can feel him vibrate with anxiety behind her.

“Shhh-hush that now, you’re well, you’re well. Be well now,” he whispers in a worried tone, holding on to her. “I won’t do you any ill, love. You can rest now. I’ll watch over you.”

“You’re the one I’m worried about.” Her eyes are wet from coughing.

Madara nuzzles her hair, keeping her close. “Never. You’re the one my heart wanted. I’ll keep you safe, just as I always have. Sleep now, love.”

She wants to, but all she can do is close her eyes. He hums into her neck and it nearly makes her melt. A butterfly kiss is innocent on her shoulder before he pulls her shirt up higher, closer to her neck, covering more of her. She shivers less.

“You’re still a devil.”

“And you’re still my priestess, because I’m _your_ devil, love.”


	3. Chapter 3

It’s been a month since the seal. A month since the devil came into her life. A month since Sakura started living with Madara. And it’s also been a month without word back from Naruto and anyone else in the village. Soon it would be a full year for her to have been in exile, banished from her home. A year without chakra, a year without healing, a year without-

Sakura cut her own thoughts short as she drops the plant back into her basket. She had been careful to remove it without hurting herself on the thorns, but she was still distracted enough to do a shoddy job of harvesting it. He roots are half stripped and leaking the liquid she gathered them for. The plant she uprooted will be dry and nearly useless by the time she makes it back home. It takes so long to walk back no her own. It takes too long to do anything.

The ruined plant is back in her hands, leaking juice into the basket she holds it over. Turning it around the light catches the thorns and there’s one long enough to be dangerous. She presses her thumb to the side of the spike and watches as red blooms between the folds of split flesh. It’s not a deep or threatening wound, but it bleeds a beautiful red down her finger. She does nothing to it and the blood snakes all the way down to her wrist, trail fresh and brilliant in the sun. It’s not a dangerous wound at all, but not even this is something she can heal.

“Damn it, what did you do?” Madara asks in a panicked tone, coming up from behind her to drop down into the grass and take her hand in his. 

He has a cloth he uses to wipe away the sliver of blood and press into her thumb. When he pulls it away a bead of red grow from where she pricked herself and he sighs in exasperation, seeing just how little a deal it was.

“You’re overreacting,” Sakura dully intones, lacking the energy to pretend to be cold with her only companion.

She wants to stay mad with him longer, hold everything he ever did to her against him, but she can’t anymore. She can’t lie to herself about how comforting it is to wake up in the middle of the night crying from night terrors and have someone there to hold her until the morning without thinking any less of her. With every passing month the anxiety of never getting her chakra back seems to double. Will she forever more be a powerless being after having sacrificed so much? Sure, she still had her taijutsu, which could be enough to help her survive lesser wilds, but her healing is gone. All that hard work and sacrifice spent for the hope that she could help people, all of it was for nothing.

“Ah!” she gasped when something warm and wet takes her thumb. She turns to the side and sees Madara sucking on the wound from her finger. He looked up at her through his lashes and the nonverbal message was clear. ‘Snap out of it.’

“Don’t do that. It’s filthy and you’re going to get dirt in your mouth now,” Sakura chastises, pulling her hand away. He released her thumb with a pop and a pout.

“Don’t do that thing, then.”

“Do what?” she asks, playing dumb.

“Don’t go to that dark place. I can see when you do it. It’s the same at night, like you gravitate towards those fears even though I’m here.” He grabs for her hand again, but only to hold it. He doesn’t try to bring it closer to his face anymore.

Sakura doesn’t know what to say to that, so she turns her face away, thinking that will make it easier to breath. He squeezes her hand and drops his face to rest against her arm.

“Please,” he whispers, and it’s so soft and hurt sounding she almost doesn’t believe it comes from him. Where is his confidence, where is his teasing, where is his snark and playful mirth? When he breaths, his breath is almost as shaky as her own.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Sakura grumbles at last. “Don’t worry about something silly like that.”

Her arm is bare at the elbow where he bends down to kiss her and Sakura shivers at the contact, but doesn’t shake him off. “Don’t forget I’m here. I am here to go with you always,” he says.

It’s the country of the land of Tea, cool and breezy and close to autumn, but it’s too hot and he’s too close and Sakura finds it hard to keep her breathing even when he touches her or holds her.

She folds her will into iron and shrugs him off with a dismissive gesture before rising to her feet with the basket of herbs. “As if I could leave you behind if I tried. Come on, I have to get these milked before tomorrow. It’s the best day for trade ins.”

“Weekends are always busy. Are you sure we can’t just, take a day off and do something fun? You always work but you don’t really need the money, do you?”

Sakura slaps him on the shoulder with little to no strength. “That’s rich coming from a guy that doesn’t pull his own weight. You’re milking half of these.”

Madara wiggles his eyebrows. “There are other things I’d much rather milk.”  

Sakura presses her lips together and muffles her own short scream before turning back in the direction of her house and storming off. _Seriously_? And she thought her heart was skipping a beat for someone like him? She must be getting desperate if a dirty mouthed, pervert devil like Madara Uchiha was making her think about kissing again.

She nearly skips a step and trips down the hill, but corrects herself with her reflexes. With her free hand, she reaches up to rub her eyes and mutter something about needing to get out and talk to normal people. Going into the market tomorrow would be a good idea. She was starting to have weird thoughts, dangerous thoughts, about a blatantly available single male who also happened to be some shade of handsome from an ascetic point of view. She could not be thinking he was…was attractive and kissable. No, just no. It had only been a month. He was a bad guy. He was a murderer. He was a devil. He was-“

“You’re shivering again,” Madara chastises, coming up behind her with the cardigan she left behind. He drapes it over her shoulders and walks alongside her to make his body a buffer against the breeze. He’s close enough that she can feel his body heat.

He’s warm.

Sakura groans out loud and Madara looks down at her with an eyebrow raised in question. Sakura ignores him and stalks on, taking care to keep her eyes down the rest of the way.

Sakura’s not worried when Madara wanders off from her at the edge of the markets. It’s easier to haggle and negotiate a price for her remedies when she doesn’t have to worry about him always being on her shoulder.

Tea isn’t the most modern of places. The idea of an unmarried young man and woman sharing the same roof for anything more than a night might make some of the older ladies talk. Sakura does good business, and the next market is too far for her to travel to easily. She could only imagine what people would think if they saw the way he sticks close to her after coming from the same home.

No, Sakura isn’t worried when Madara wanders off from her at the markets, but she is worried when she finds him again. He’s surrounded himself with a handful of ladies, all of which are captivated by whatever story he’s in the middle of telling them. His expressions are animated and at one point she can tell he’s sharing with them something that has upset him, since the lady closest lays a hand on his arm and pats it encouragingly.

Sakura decides she’s not jealous, but she is frightened. It would be one thing if Madara had been surrounded by a group of young single ladies, at least Sakura could understand that. But no, Madara just had to make things troublesome surrounding himself with the grandmothers of the village, most of whom looked like they had been around during his era.

One of them, the silver haired elder who had pat his arm earlier, passes something in a tin towards him and shakes her finger in his face. Madara smiles and looks almost bashful. One of the other ladies says something and they all break out in laughter, making Madara blush. Yes, Sakura is afraid.

Knowing she has everything she needs, Sakura starts to back away, hoping he doesn’t see her. He’ll feel her departure soon enough and come after her. Maybe she should be kind and give him more time for himself, but she’s too intimidated by the mysterious, unquestionable power the elder ladies seem to wield. She’s only communicated with a handful of them, when describing what to use for various ailments, but she is wise enough to recognize power when she sees it. Maybe they don’t have official titles, but they are powerful women nevertheless, and Sakura doesn’t want to anger any of them.

She makes it more than half a mile before he’s next to her, appearing in a burst of wind. “Hey, why’d you take off without letting me know?” he asks, sounding lighter than before, almost happier. There is buoyancy in his walk, and a light to his eyes as he looks down at her.

“…Couldn’t find you,” Sakura finally admits, knowing he’ll think she’s lying.

“I don’t believe you.”

“Yeah, but I don’t care.” She lengthens her steps and he huffs before doing the same to keep even with her.

“So cruel. Kami must really pity me for my heart to have chosen you as a master,” he teases.

“I think I remember saying something about sending you back, and honestly, get it right. _I_ was the one who did the summoning and you were the mistake that came through. Speaking of which, I haven’t gotten anywhere of note in those texts. I should visit the shrine again to see what they have in the vault underground. Maybe something new will turn up.”

Madara chuckles and it makes her irritated to hear how honest it sounds. “Nah, you like me too much to send me back. If you did, who would you talk to? It’s amazing how you haven’t gone crazy from so long on your own out here by yourself. What has it been now, ten months?”

He was right, but Sakura didn’t feel like admitting that to him. “Haruno may be known for madness, but we’ve adapted for it. There are plenty of gods to listen to if I care to take a dip in the spiritual void.”

Madara rolls his eyes. “Yeah, but they’re not nearly as fun to look at or entertaining.”

“You’re very full of yourself.”

“ _Someone_ has to be.”  He skips a little bit and turns so that he’s ahead of her, walking backwards with his hands behind his head. His grin is impossible to miss. “Speaking of which, wanna go somewhere special for dinner. I’m always cooking.”

“No thank you, I have to read more of the scripture texts if I’m going to be exchanging them for new ones. I’ll need to concentrate on my work.”

“Or, you could concentrate on me.”

Sakura doesn’t have chakra, but she is still strong, so when she jumps forward, she travels far. Madara flusters are her take off, before turning around to catch up to her. It’s not hard, as he’s just as strong as her and unlike her, he can use chakra to bolster his steps.

They make it back to the house and he becomes a phantom again, staying out of her way as she puts her money and supplies up and pulls out her work. An hour later Madara knocks on the door to her bedroom, calling her to dinner.

He’s made salmon again with stuffed mushrooms and rice. It’s a nice meal, one he’s made before, but when she sits down, she notices something is different.

“I didn’t know you needed to eat,” Sakura says, eyeing the extra setting he sits down in front of. His face is slightly turned away, and with his heavy bangs it’s hard to see, but she almost thinks there is color in his cheeks.

“I-I do need to eat and sleep just like anyone else, but because of my resurrected body is so optimal, I need it so much less than you. I typically eat once a day and sleep every two to three days.”

“Ah.” She nods to the meal. “Do you like salmon then?”

“N-not especially.”

“You could have made something you really liked if you only eat once a day. Come to think of it, I’ve never really seen you eat so I have no idea what you might like. Is there something?”

He shakes his head picking at his fish before freeing a part he can guide to his mouth. He chews slowly and swallows before answering. “I try not to be picky.”

Sakura thinks back to all the dinners he’s made her and all the food he’s taken upon himself to prepare for her without asking. She is used to cooking, having lived alone for so long, but after being spoiled for nearly a month with breakfast and dinner every day, Sakura has a hard time remembering the last time she prepared anything in the kitchen.

“Thank you.” He looks up when he hears her voice, face puzzled. Sakura swallows her own clump of rice before explaining. “You’ve cooked for me without asking and…I never thanked you. I’m sorry I let it go so long, and… just thank you.”

He looks up, dark eyes wide as he watches her. Slowly his eyes fade to the color of red and Sakura frowns at the subconscious action, but doesn’t chastise him for it. Outside, a soft roll of thunder announces the future rains to come. It will be another cold night.

“I love you.”

Sakura drops her chopsticks in surprise, eyes growing wide. She has no words for him, only a wide eyed expression where her mouth hangs slightly open.

Madara notices, but doesn’t hesitate. He leans in, across the table, keeping his red eyes on her as he repeats himself. “I know I love you. Every time I tell you my heart chose you, I meant it. My heart chose you because I love you. I didn’t know it at first, but now I do and you need to know it to because I think you will come to love me as well.”

“Madara…”

He reaches across the table and grabs her hand before she can pull it away. His eyes are wide and he almost looks afraid. “I’ve done terrible things, Sakura. I’ve done terrible things to you and I’ve not always thought of you with this much reverence, not when you first summoned me with your necromancy, but I’ve come know you and my heart aches for you every night I hold you through the tears. I want you to look at me. I want you to see me as a man that loves you. I can’t change what I’ve done, but I live for you now, seal or no seal.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying,” Sakura wants to chuckle, but it comes out sounding broken like a whisper.

Madara lets go of her hand and moves around the table. Sakura pushes her chair back and away before turning to face him. Hesitantly, he kneels down in front of her, still impossibly tall as he only comes up to her chest when kneeling.

“I don’t deserve you, and you may never look at me with anything more than disgust, and that’s fine because I know that’s what I deserve. But I dare to hope for _us_ Sakura.”

“Madara I don’t want to hear this right now. I’m not-“ Sakura swallows and shakes her head. He’s too honest sounding, he’s too soft and telling him no feels like hurting him, but she has to do it.

“You think I’m going anywhere? Hn.” He stands and there is confidence she would call cocky in the way he holds himself while grinning down at her. “You’re wrong if you think this isn’t something I’m willing to take the long road with. No, you’re mine, my eternal priestess and there’s proof of that between us. And me, I’m yours, like it or not, that’s what the fates chose for us. So yeah, maybe the thought of me right now isn’t all that appealing or exactly what you had in mind, but I’m not going anywhere. And one day, one day you’ll see that my words, what I feel for you, it’s the real deal.”

“I’m not going to be here forever, and the seal…Leaf is going to take me back one day. Madara, nothing will come of this.” She swallows, because the words are heaver than she thought they would be. She sucks in a breath and realizes that suddenly she doesn’t want to hurt him. Somehow, somewhere along the line he became a person she wanted to not ever hurt. Where had all her hurt and hate gone?

Madara smiles easily and rolls his shoulder like the world could turn against him and he wouldn’t care. He moves away, stepping back into the kitchen to get something, and when he brings it back Sakura can see what it is. The tin the older woman had gifted him with.

“What is that?”

Madara grins, handing it to her. “I told the old ladies I was in love with a woman who wouldn’t return my affections, and they all told me to try my best. These are supposed to be love cookies, but I think they’re just oatmeal raisin. They’re good though. I tried one and there’s no weird love drugs in it.”

He peels the cover off and inside are the cookies. Sakura takes one and hums around the mouthful. He’s watching her, and after she swallows, he takes one for himself. Outside, soft rain begins to touch down.    

 When she goes to bed she goes alone, but in the middle of the night, when the rain is heavy and seedy on her roof, Sakura sits up and pulls all her blankets around her like a cape. Leaving her bed, the floor is cold to her naked toes.

Madara is reclining on her couch, the one barely big enough for his long frame, but his eyes are closed. She watches for a minute, tracking the rise and fall of his chest before moving across the floor. She makes no sound until she is right beside him, and it’s not a surprise when he cracks open an eye.

He’s groggy as he sits up and calls her name, but Sakura pushes him back into the deep cushions and then turns around to lay beside him on the too tiny couch with her blankets making a cape around them. Madara grunts in surprise, but moves to throw the rest of the pillows off and make more room for the both of them. He doesn’t say her bed would be bigger, it’s something she already knows.

“I want to be close to you,” she whispers, hiding her face in his arm. “But I’ll forget I ever said that in the morning, so don’t repeat it.”

She feels his arms move, tugging her closer. She’s flush with his chest and comfortable enough to pull her legs up and thread them through his. She hears the way his heart stutters and feels his tremble. He whispers something, then buries his face in her hair, kissing and inhaling what he can.

Outside the rain comes down and Sakura cuddles closer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 3 of the series  
> Parts 4 and more will continue in August for UchiSaku week on Tumblr.


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